DebConf8/Argentina/Mendoza

This is the information for the city of Mendoza, in Argentina. This was intended as a proposal for hosting DebConf8. But the DebConf8/Argentina/Mar del Plata proposal got elected instead.

For general info about the local-team in Argentina, and info about the country see DebConf8/Argentina.

City of Mendoza

The Ejército de los Andes Hotel

• Are you suggesting a city, a town, a village, a spa in the middle of nowhere?

  The hotel Ejército de los Andes is located 8km away of Mendoza (Wikipedia entry), one of the biggest cities in Argentina. In the surrounding areas there are mostly private farms, but a cab will take you into the city in about 15 minutes, for less than 5 dollars.

  • Wikimapia location (keep in mind that the photos are outdated)
  • Map of the surrounding zone. The hotel is the number 7 in black, and there are approximately 3 km from the hotel to the 7 Highway.
• How many people live there?

  As per the 2001 census Mendoza has about 111,000 inhabitants, plus 848.660 in its metropolitan area, making it the fourth-largest conurbation in Argentina.

A view of Mendoza

• How easy/convenient is the proposed place to get all strange and regular kinds of hardware?

  Since Mendoza is a big city, there should be businesses to buy any kind of hardware.

  • Electronic/electricity shops
    • List of some electricity shops
    • List of some electronic shops
  • Computer stores (A "media markt" like enduser oriented store doesn't count)
    • List of some computer stores
  • Supermarkets, etc.

    There are plenty of supermarkets in the city, and there are some supermarkets near the hotel too.

    • List of "Atomo" supermarkets (the ones that say "Ciudad" and "Guaymallén" are relevant to us).
• How easy is to handicapped people move there?

Mendoza at night

• Which is the nearest airport?

  Mendoza International Airport. (MDZ)

  You can get there from:

  • Santiago de Chile, Chile (SCL)
  • Buenos Aires International Airport (EZE)

  And also (less likely) from:

  • Buenos Aires Domestic Airport (AEP)
  • Córdoba, Argentina

  Be careful, Buenos Aires' Airports are 45 minutes apart from each other.

• Are there any cheap airlines flying near the chosen city?

  No really cheap airlines in Latin America.

• How long does the trip from the airport to the venue take?

  About 15 minutes by taxi.

Conference Facilities

• • What kind of places are available suitable for hacklabs, workshops, BoFs and talks?

    There are a couple of small auditoriums, and a bigger one for the talks. There are even bigger auditoriums, that we might consider renting, but seem too big, actually.

  • How many people fit in each of them?

    Estar: 60 people (good for BOFs) (U$S 200 per day)

    Cristal: 80 people (good for hacklab) (U$S 200 per day)

    Azul: 150 people (good for talks) (U$S 350 per day)

    Colonial: 300 people (for bigger talks)

    Burbuja: 1500 people (outside the main premises)

• How much does it cost to rent these facilities?

  1 hacklab for 14 days + 1 BOF place for 6 days + 1 Talks place for 7 days: U$S 6450

• How far away are the locations from each other? (auditoriums, hacklabs, restaurant, sleeping quarters, info-desk)

  Everything would be inside the same hotel. The hotel is about 200 m long, so that's the maximum distance that you might need to walk, from one end to the other.

• How flexible can that be handled? Can smaller auditoriums be merged into a bigger one?

  No. Each room is independent.

• Are tables/chairs fixed, or can we arrange them to fit more people/give more room to the people that we need?

  There are no tables/chairs fixed.

• Is the venue ready for handicapped people? Note: Keep in mind that it's not only motion-handicapped - Is the area safe for people with any kind of handicap? (There are sight and hearing-impaired people, too.) Bonus: What people is it not good for?
  • Access to all areas with ramps and/or elevators? (Note: carrying somebody over some steps is not usually an acceptable option.)

    Yes, there are ramps on all needed places.

    • Are there people with experience handling handicapped people, who checked that?

• Are blueprints with exact distances available to us (to be kept confidential on request)?

• What kind of audio equipment is already present at the auditoriums?
  • Wireless or stationary mics?
  • clip-on kind of mics or cary in your hand mics?
  • How many of them?
• Will the hacklabs be allowed to stay open 24x7? What time schedule do they offer?
• What kind of security will be there?

• Are there any limitations regarding the consumptions of food / alcohol? Where do what limitations apply?
  • How far is it to the nearest convenience stores / all-night restaurants?

    To eat out during the night you could either ask for room-service, or go into the city. As stated, the trip to the city is short and quite cheap (specially if you share the cab). Phone-cabs can be call during all the night.

Food

The dining room at the hotel

• How much are the meals per person per day?

  Breakfast+Lunch+Dinner: U$S 8

• Is the eating place near the talks place / the hacklabs?

  It's in the same hotel

  • The restaurant can accomodate 500 people. Food is served at certain hours:
    • Breakfast: 07:30 to 10:00
    • Lunch: 12:30 to 14:00
    • Dinner: 20:30 to 22:00

    Outside of that schedule, food can be ordered (at the person's charge) as room-service.

• What kind of food would be served?
  • In what fashion? (service to the table, limited buffet, open buffet, etc.)
• Would food for vegetarians / vegan / lactose-alergic / religious (of any denomination) people be available?

  Yes. There's food for vegetarians, lactose-alergic, or celiac people available. We only need to tell the hotel about the amounts of each in advance.

  • How many meals do we need to order to get those kind of "special" meals?

    No minimum number.

  • Will it cost extra to get those special meals?

    No.

• In a two week period, how many more or less equal meals can we expect?

Network connectivity

• Is the area already wired with regular network infrastructure? (much preferrably: 100Mbps or 1Gbps switched)

  No.

• How much does it cost and how difficult is it to get a big internet connection? (10/20 Mbits at least)

  TelMex offers to provide a dedicated line for U$S 2000 for a whole month. This is through LDMS technology. We can have ADSL for much less, but it would need to be split in different connections.

• How much work does it imply to cover the area with wireless links?
• If we use someone else's infrastructure, how easy / flexible can that be handled, regarding routing / firewall / ip-range / public access / other stuff?
  • Do we have restrictions on allowed ports?
  • Are we traffic-shaped? Or can we set a traffic shaper if we need so?
• Would it be possible to set up the network before Debcamp? (a day or two, earlier would be nicer, in order to handle problems gracefully. Additional weeks for wireless.)

Special rooms

Both for server and video rooms:

• General conditions for the rooms
  • Size
  • Have they/do they need air conditioning?
  • What electrical load can they handle?

Accomodation

Another view of the hotel and its pool

• How much does it cost per person per night?

  Around U$S 20, might vary a little.

• Is the place where people are going to sleep near the conference facilities?

  It's all in the same hotel. However, the hotel is quite big, and some rooms might be 100 to 200 meters away from the rest of the facilities, but not much more than that.

• Is it able to handle a varying number from 20 to 400 of people?

  Yes, but it's not able to accomodate more than 415 people. It has:

  • 89 triple rooms: 267 people
  • 17 apartments for 4 people: 68 people
  • 4 mini-hostels for 20 people: 80 people

• Is it able to handle non-native speaking people? (i.e. do the people at the sleeping facilities speak English?)

  Yes. People at the reception and at the restaurant speak English.

• Will there be a need of a "Debconf" info-desk, or would the local (hotel or such) people be able to handle that themselves? (See InfoDesk for details on duties)

  Probably not. The "events" people at the hotel will probably be capable of handling most of the info-desk stuff.

• Will it be possible for couples to stay in their own rooms?

  It depends on the amount of people that come, but most probably yes.

• How many room keys would be available?
• Are there other hotels around?

  Not very close. There are many hotels in the city of Mendoza, but staying there would imply travelling to and from the city everyday.

• Are there rooms ready for handicapped people? How many?

Fun and Free time

• What activities can be done during the free time?

  The hotel has a huge sorrounding area, with space for different sports (football, volley, basketball, tennis, etc). But, since we are planning for mid-August, these will probably be all covered in snow.

  Inside playroom: pool, table-tennis, table-football (metegol).

  Activities outside the hotel might include:

  • Visit to the nearby wineries
  • Several museums
  • Go shopping (List of possible places

A view of the Aconcagua, the highest mountain in the Americas

• What would be a possible Day Trip?
  • Skiing?
  • Is the proposed location ready to receive people with disabilities?
• How expensive would that be?

Local Sponsors

• Do you have a list of prospective sponsors that might be interested in the conference? Money, hardware, connectivity, etc.

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